Black Friday
by jancat10
Summary: The things we do for love: Darcy does Walmart on the day after Thanksgiving.


_Haven't posted anything here in a while. But I do have news about the upcoming publication of my story The Most Interesting Man in the World, posted on JustineR's page here. We've expanded it and it's even more hilarious. Look for it in January._

 **Black Friday**

It was abhorrent.

He, Fitzwilliam J. Darcy, was standing inside a Walmart. Inside a Walmart in some backwater called Meryton. In the clothing department of a Walmart in some backwater on the day after Thanksgiving, figuring out pajama sizes. Black Friday indeed. All because he hadn't eaten the damn turkey. Being a vegetarian had never been such a mixed blessing.

It had all begun with a bad bird, undercooked by the now absent chef. Charles had ordered a free-range turkey with a pedigree of perfectly seasoned grains for its diet, before being gently executed for the dinner table. "It will be the Thanksgiving to die for," he had boasted, thrusting his iPad into Darcy's face. "Look at this bird!"

Within thirty seconds of the silence which followed, Bingley had recollected that his best friend was a British vegetarian. Didn't do Thanksgiving, didn't do meat.

"Uh, sorry."

Still, as he always did, Darcy heeded Charles when he beckoned and begged. "Janey and I are cooking for the clan! Everyone will be at Netherfield. Don't you have meetings or something in New York? You can come over for it!"

And so he did. Not for Charles' sake. But for his own. He wanted to see Elizabeth Bennet again. It had been four months since they'd last met. She would be at Bingley's house, celebrating the happy couple's first holiday as an engaged couple. He could only hope she wouldn't have that _guy_ with her, the one she danced with too many times at the engagement party while he'd stood against the wall, near the bar, anywhere he could watch her and not be the intrusive jerk she had clearly made him out to be during their last conversation. Confrontation. Whatever it was. He had insulted her family while complimenting her. Who asks a woman he admires how she survived unscathed from such a family? _He did_. Why? Because he was, as she so succinctly put it, "a jerk of the first order." Also, they were both rather drunk, which had led to the kiss that had led to the question that had led to the insult.

Yes, he had screwed up, but he could not quite regret that kiss. He wanted another chance and another kiss. Elizabeth had done nothing for the past year but charm him while making clear she disliked him, but what were 4,000 transatlantic miles and a postponed board meeting if he had the chance to show her that he was a different man than the one she had spurned last spring? Of course, he would have to find an opportunity to actually talk to her first.

He figured he could manage it, survive the Bennets and the Bingleys while celebrating a holiday seemingly focused on gorging oneself into a stupor, staring at American football games on television, and plotting one's shopping schedule. On Monday, he went for a haircut. On Tuesday, he flew to New York. On Wednesday, he bought a box of crème brûlée tarts. On Thursday, he drove to Netherfield.

So there they all were, shooed from the kitchen while Charles, Jane and her sister, Mary, a culinary student with a bossy manner, bustled around the kitchen. Only Elizabeth was allowed to slip inside the swinging door. Or escape inside, it appeared. He had no such golden ticket, so he sat stoically in a chair upholstered with green swirly things resembling sickly fish and observed his fellow holiday celebrants. Hurst, wearing what Darcy suspected were his holiday fat pants, mumbled about the need for "just a taste." Mrs. Bennet grumbled and clucked and re-set the table with the china and linens she preferred. Her two youngest daughters gazed at their phones while their father stared and snorted at a football game on the television. Caroline rolled her eyes and wondered aloud, frequently, at the point of having a nice kitchen and a big house and not hiring caterers to use it.

Oh no, none of those professional cooks with their awareness of cross contamination and food safety here. Not when Charles and Jane and Mary could mince about the kitchen and season, stir, cook and serve up a feast that would lay flat the household and guests with dysentery, or botulism, or the plague.

Most likely, it was food poisoning from the beautiful but seriously undercooked 27-lb. turkey. It had been delivered, fully plucked and seasoned and bedecked with crispy bits and browned and so succulent looking on the outside.

Darcy had sat at the table and had been tempted. He already had eaten two bites of a lovely salmon spread Elizabeth had prepared. He rarely indulged but the souls of fish didn't bother him as did those of birds and cows and pigs and lambs. His vegan sister liked to call him a hypocrite on this distinction, but it was a distinction he was comfortable with, especially when the dish had been made by Elizabeth.

Though tempted by the truly amazing aroma of the elaborately dressed and clearly well-nourished sacrificial turkey, Darcy's conscience tugged him back to the moral path he had chosen in college, and he instead took a second helping of Brussel sprouts, gummed his tofurkey, and ignored the sympathetic thigh squeezes given him by Caroline, who rarely ate meat around him on the off chance it might ingratiate her to him. He ignored the mirthful glances he felt from Hurst and the loud and very hungry Bennet family. The two youngest sisters never stopped commenting on the meal and oohing and ahhing over the colors! The flavors! The presentation! He had a teenage sister and she didn't keep her phone at the ready to snap photos of every dish laid before her. Damn foodies and their need for Instagram glory.

God, that turkey smelled good. Americans were strange and loud and far too free with their smiles and their hugs and their judgements, but by god, he had never had a truly bad meal in the country. Which mostly consisted of New York, Chicago, L.A., Newport, and Palm Beach, but still….

Elizabeth, sitting at the other end of the table next to her father, picked at her dinner. He tried not to be obvious in his observations. He might not be able to speak with her but he could keep an eye on her appetite; she seemed fond of the corn casserole and mashed potatoes and all things green, he noted. Vegetarian? Or unwell? She looked tired. Perhaps that damn MBA program was killing her spirit. Or she missed a boyfriend off at his family's celebration.

 _Dammit._

Banned from the kitchen before dinner, Darcy had hoped to make a good impression by being helpful afterwards but he was shoo'ed from the sink when he tried to scrape plates. "Don't ruin your manicure," he was told by a smirking Mr. Bennet, ensconced back in front of the television. "Rest up for dessert."

He espied Elizabeth pulling on her coat to get some fresh air but Caroline intercepted his move to join her. "How can my brother not hire staff to clean up? What a nightmare." She scowled and his expression matched hers when Elizabeth glanced up and away from them. Sighing, he joined Hurst and Mr. Bennet in the family room and stared uncomprehendingly at the football game, tuning out the mens' soughing snores until they were called in for coffee and dessert.

Back in the dining room, everyone paused to admire the bounty of pies, cupcakes, tarts and cookies.

"Well _someone_ went to Magnolia Bakery," Mrs. Bennet cried, turning her gaze from the tarts to a red-faced Darcy.

"And he spent a pretty penny," her husband added.

"Lizzy, you baked?" Lydia said, staring at the pie Elizabeth made, a chocolate pecan pie with crumbling, singed crusts and a large wet depression in its center.

Mr. Bennet smirked and shook his head. "That's my Lizzy, meant for the boardroom not the kitchen," he joked while waving away an offered slice. The foodies dismissed it and devoured the French silk and pumpkin pies and crème brûlée and apple tarts. But Darcy had had eyes only for Elizabeth's pie and reached for a knife to cut the first messy slice. Charles looked at it mournfully while Caroline snapped, "My brother and I are allergic to tree nuts! Put it in the kitchen!"

Elizabeth grimaced, picked it up and carried it away. As the masses converged on the desserts, Darcy followed her into the kitchen.

"May I have a slice?"

She looked at him skeptically, and scooped up a burned, soggy piece. He sat down at the island while she wiped the counter and watched him warily. "You're a daring one," she said. "God only knows what I might have done to that pie."

She broke into a smile when Darcy asked for a second slice before rising to pour himself a glass of milk. She cut two slices, pulled out the vanilla ice cream, and sat with him at the kitchen counter. It was the ugliest, best-tasting pie he had ever eaten. They made small talk, about her job and his sister, and about the wedding planner from hell adored by Jane and feared by Charles. It was fifteen minutes of conversation and companionship that slipped into something approaching friendship.

Then the dozen guests dispersed. The Bennet ladies moved off to the media room for old movies. The Hursts left for a hotel, determined to be closer to the stores for the four a.m. shopping bargains. Caroline stayed behind at Netherfield, claiming online shopping deals were better.

Alas, Darcy reflected, no deals were to be done that day. There was other business at hand. Within hours of dinner, the happy turkey eaters were all felled by some unspeakable stomach bug. The five Bennet sisters, their parents and Charles lay abed. Groaning, moaning, vomiting, and doing other unspeakable things.

Only Darcy and Caroline were well. She had come to his room at two a.m. and closed the door. An Hermès scarf was tied over her nose and mouth, and in her arms she carried mouthwash, air fresheners, and a bottle of wine. She pushed her way inside the room, slammed the door, and lowered her mask.

"Oh my god, Darcy," she wailed. "This house reeks! We must stay together and barricade the doors and defend ourselves against the trots."

Charles could be heard crying out, "Oh no….not again!"

Caroline stifled a scream and buried her head in Darcy's chest.

Already overwhelmed by the horror of the noises he could hear through various doors, Darcy sighed, exhausted. He had survived stomach bugs and runny noses, potty training and female trouble with Georgiana, and he would face it now, tenfold. Or something like that; he was a tad foggy with numbers at this hour.

"It's Black Friday," he said to Caroline in a bleary voice as he pulled his arm out from her grip. "The stores are open. We must lay in supplies. Popsicles and tissues and that crocodile drink for their electrolytes. Saltines and soda. Sanitizing wipes and Purell."

"Gatorade," she said. A flushing sound was heard next door.

"Right," he said, yawning. "And air fresheners."

She stared at him. "Order more wine too. Pinot noir."

He blinked and looked around the room for the sweater he'd pulled off a few hours earlier.

"Order?"

"Yes, they can deliver wine," she sniffed, "even here in Podunkville."

"Caroline, there's no delivery. It's Black Friday. There's no staff here, your brother gave them the holidays off. We're on our own. I remember passing a shopping strip mall a few miles from here. One of us needs to go while the other takes care of the Bennets."

"No!"

More flushing, this time across the hall.

"And your brother…."

She shook her head and backed away. "Those stupid meat eaters! Charles had to get some special bird killed in a gentle manner after dining on caviar and Champagne for its entire stupid life!"

"Caroline, he didn't know."

"He's an idiot. He undercooked it! I swear, the meat was pink!"

"Caroline, they're all sick. It's our obligation. You would want to be cared for."

"No, I can't. I don't do vomit and I do not do strip malls."

"And you think I do?"

Caroline's eyes were wild with some fearsome combination of hate and revulsion. "I'm leaving."

She opened the door. Lydia, or some ghostly apparition of her, stood in the hallway, weaving. "Kitty locked me out," she croaked. "I threw up in her hair."

Caroline shrieked and ran down the hall. Darcy guided Lydia back to her room and within minutes, he heard the front door slam shut and car tires squealing on the driveway. His phone beeped and he glanced at the screen.

 _"Don't die! And tell Charles I had a work emergency. XOX._ "

As if she worked.

The dull roar of misery and flushing toilets had led him on this foray into the hinterlands of America. Now here he was, in the middle of the night, alone at Walmart, pushing a cart with a dubious front wheel through hordes of insane and completely rude Christmas bargain shoppers. His head pounding from the umpteenth twangy cover of a cheesy Christmas song, Darcy loaded his cart, thanked the eager greeter who had guided him around the store, and slipped the kindly man a fifty-dollar bill. He grabbed a coffee at Dunkin' Donuts and was back at the house before sunrise. He could still hear that damn "dum-de-dum-dum" in his head.

Refreshed by the caffeine, he unloaded the groceries, separated them into piles, repacked the bags and began his rounds. Lydia and Kitty remained feverish, but were curled up under the covers watching reality TV. Lydia pointed to a pile of stained pajamas. "Kitty spilled. I tripped. We need more Sprite."

"And I can't find my phone charger," Kitty moaned.

Mary was asleep, her hair matted and her face pale. _Someone needs to clean her up_ , he thought warily as he set her bag at the foot of the bed. _Someone who isn't me._

Mrs. Bennet opened her door and peered through. Her husband was asleep, she said in a loud stage whisper. "I need cold compresses and a sitz bath."

Darcy swallowed. _Google sitz bath._

When he reached Charles's room, he found Jane, wan and not even close to the blonde perfection she always appeared to be. He rather liked this vision of a rumpled, makeup-free Jane, although she certainly did not smell very good. "I am so sorry about all of this, William. The turkey was pink inside, I think."

She was interrupted by a load groan and some noises they tried to ignore. "Charles is in the bathroom," she explained needlessly. "I think we need a plunger." Darcy grimaced and nodded before handing her a grocery bag filled with necessities.

After he had supplied all the rooms with bells or baby monitors, wet wipes and tissues, juices and water, toilet paper and clean towels and crackers—and a plunger for Charles—Darcy returned to Elizabeth's room. She had turned him away earlier, claiming she was fine. But he needed to know for himself.

He knocked softly, and upon hearing a noise, he opened the door. She was pale, her hair stuck up oddly, and she was shivering under a tiny t-shirt. "Here." He pulled off his sweater and handed it to her. A moment later he wondered how clean that sweater was, but she seemed grateful for the gesture. He coaxed her back to her bed, and handed her a bottle of Gatorade.

"How did you know I liked the dark blue kind best?" she said softly. When he looked at her, he noticed a small grin.

"I asked Jane."

"That was nice," she mumbled. "Why aren't you sick?"

"I didn't have the turkey."

"Ah. I only had a few bites. Powerfully toxic bird, hmm?"

"Yes. Truly foul fowl," he replied, coaxing a small smile from her. "Go to sleep," he said, brushing away a few strands of hair from her damp forehead.

"'Kay. Thanks for taking care of us," she said, yawning. "I know we're disgusting."

"No, you're not. You're all very nice, really," he said desperately. _Dammit!_

"Yes, we are. Stinky and gross. You're sweet." She smiled and fell asleep.

Darcy stared at her, his heart pounding.

Finally, recognizing how inappropriate it was for him to be sitting on her bed, he went downstairs. The bells rang and the baby monitors hummed with complaints and moans. Someone was always awake, thrashing in distress or irritable about being thirsty. He spent the rest of the day in the kitchen, preparing food or carrying things up and down the stairs. He was exhausted but he kept moving, throwing a load of filthy pajamas in the washing machine. By four o'clock, when he realized he had run out of juice and Gatorade, he began to panic. Another trip to Walmart? It gave him a sick feeling. Actually, he really did feel funny. His muscles ached. His teeth hurt. His stomach seemed fine, though. He leaned against the refrigerator.

"Darcy? Are you okay?"

He looked up and saw Elizabeth standing in the doorway, staring at him. His eyes roamed over her, noting her blue polka-dot pajama pants and the oversized white sweater that bared one shoulder. Her hair was wet and pulled into a loose bun. She looked wonderful.

"Hey, you showered. By yourself?"

She gave him an incredulous look. "Sorry?"

"I mean, you're sick," he said quickly. "You might've fainted. Someone should've checked on you."

She bit back a smile. "I'm fine now. My insides were far less contaminated than everyone else's." She looked around the kitchen. "I thought you might need help, but it seems like you have everything under control."

He shrugged. "Hardly. I'm managing."

"You're good at that managing stuff."

He blinked, wondering if she was referring to how he'd interfered with Charles and her sister, but the expression on her face was warm rather than angry.

"Thank you for all of this, for taking care of my family and me." She wrinkled her nose. "It couldn't have been easy."

He remained silent, tongue-tied.

"Really, thank you, for all of us, for taking on all of this," Elizabeth said, gesturing at the dishes in the drying rack and the laundry basket of clean towels, "which had to be pretty awful and mortifying, and being our nurse, cook and maid."

Lost in the warmth of her smile, he fumbled to reply. "I don't need any thanks, I wanted to take care of you. Not simply out of duty and compassion," he said slowly, his voice shaking a bit as he went on. "Your family owe me nothing. Much as I respect them, I believe I thought only of you."

"So I'm the only one you'd give the sweater off your back?"

"Yes."

"And you won't hate me for dripping tea and cracker crumbs on it?"

"Never."

A door opened, then another one, and a chorus of voices began crying out.

"Is there any chicken soup?"

"My sheets are dirty."

"I need ginger ale!"

He slumped. "I need to make another run to the store."

"Another run?" She looked at him closely. "You went out, on Black Friday?"

"For soup and crackers and Gatorade and—"

"Oh." She looked simultaneously embarrassed and amused. "You didn't know about Charles's new garage refrigerator and Costco membership?"

"No," he said slowly. "No, I did not."

"Sorry. My mother is teaching him about buying in bulk." She looked a little chagrined before giggling. "On the bright side, there's plenty of soup, ginger ale, and paper towels on hand, so no more shopping. Besides," she added, "you're due a nap."

"And a shower. All by myself," he added, grinning.

"And here I was worried you needed help." She stepped toward him and squeezed his arm. "Off with you. I'll handle the troops now."

She gave him the kind of smile he'd dreamed of seeing, warm and sexy and inviting. Or was he imagining it? He was awfully tired and hungry; he'd been up since one a.m. and had had nothing to eat but a frozen pizza and leftover pie. He smelled of Lysol and bleach and chicken broth and fabric softener. She was beautiful and sweet and he was repellent.

"Wait…" A shrill voice sounded behind him.

Darcy turned his head and saw Mrs. Bennet walking into the kitchen, her newly purchased, oversized Walmart nightgown flowing around her. Kitty and Lydia, each clad in leopard-print footie pajamas he'd found in Caroline's dresser, trailed behind her.

"William, you wonderful man," Mrs. Bennet cried, "thank you for taking care of us." She opened her arms and pulled him into a hug. Murmuring their own gratitude, Kitty and Lydia followed suit. Darcy braced himself as out of nowhere, Mary—pajamas spotted with vomit, hair unwashed and with her face the pallor of wallpaper paste—appeared and squirmed into the group embrace.

That was the last thing he remembered before finding himself sprawled on the kitchen floor, his head in Elizabeth's lap.

"Hey," she said. "Welcome back."

"What happened?" He sat up, rubbing the back of his head. She placed an icepack where his hand had been. "I've never passed out before."

"You've also never had a group hug with my mom and sisters." She shook her head. "A close encounter with the Bennets doesn't usually go this badly, but we also aren't usually this gross and stinky."

"Oh." He realized they were alone again in the kitchen. He looked up at her. "You're never gross and stinky. You're perfect."

"And you are delusional, but I'm going to remind you of that compliment. Often."

"Over dinner? Sometime?" If she said no at least he could plead he was delirious and pretend he didn't remember asking. But she didn't say no.

"Over dinner sometime in a place that is not Netherfield and has no members of my family within thirty miles."

"It's a date… I mean, a deal," he said quickly, woozy but smiling.

Elizabeth stood up and offered him her hand. "Come on, my turn to play doctor."


End file.
